Craig EllisonVZ Navigator Version 4Verizon's latest version of VZ Navigator for its GPS-equipped cell phones adds 3D view, live traffic, and a number of location-based services, making it a well-rounded, affordable alternative to a dedicated GPS.

Cellular coverage may be unavailable in some rural areas. No turn-by-turn list view.

Bottom Line

Verizon's latest version of VZ Navigator for its GPS-equipped cell phones adds 3D view, live traffic, and a number of location-based services, making it a well-rounded, affordable alternative to a dedicated GPS.

You can get a GPS device for around $100 to $150 these days, but that's still a lot of money if you only occasionally need navigation assistance. What's more, at the entry level you often won't get higher-end features like text-to-speech conversion, live traffic updates, or current fuel prices. Verizon's VZ Navigator Version 4 offers all of these features and saves you cash by making use of hardware you may already havea Verizon mobile phone with a GPS radio.

Similar Products

Last year, when we looked at both Verizon's previous version of VZ Navigator and TeleNav's GPS Navigator, only TeleNav supported live traffic. With this iteration, VZ Navigator adds live traffic and a number of additional real-time location-based services, placing the product on a par with the feature set found in dedicated personal navigation devices like the Garmin nüvi 760.

The Basics

There are pros and cons with cell phonebased GPS. One big advantage is that since the navigation data is server-based, rather than hardware-based, mapping and points-of-interest data is always the most up-to-date available. With RDS-based traffic found on dedicated GPS devices, traffic incidents for an entire region are "looped" on a broadcast approximately every two minutes. With cellular-based live traffic, alerts are in real time. Verizon's VZ Navigator is powered by Networks In Motion, and is actually a customized version of the company's AtlasBook Navigator program. Other versions of AtlasBook run on other cellular networks including Alltel and Sprint.

Another benefit of cell-based systems is that you can dabble. Verizon charges $2.99 a day or $9.99 per month for VZ Navigator (plus data/airtime usage, which is typically minimal).

On the downside, cell-phone screens are typically much smaller than those found on dedicated GPS devices. VZ Navigator has addressed this with a dashboard view that features large vector graphics to show you the direction of the next turn, and adds text-to-speech conversion, so the device can announce street names. Another objection is that cellular navigation works only when you are actually navigating to a destination. One of the things I like about most dedicated GPS boxes is that you can simply display a map view to see your surroundings even if you aren't trying to get somewhere specific.

VZ Navigator's most important new feature is live traffic data, which is currently available for 75 cities. For these cities your routes can be calculated based on both current live traffic information and historical traffic data, giving you a more accurate estimated time of arrival. You can view traffic incident and flow data for your selected route, and opt to receive alerts about traffic conditions ahead of you on your route.

With the price of fuel these days, knowing where to find cheap gas is another valuable feature. When you search for gas from the POI menu, a list of stations appears, along with whatever pricing data is available. There's no way to tell how old that pricing data is, unfortunately, and in many cases pricing is listed only for regular gas. During testing, I found in a random drive-by of local gas stations that the pricing provided by the service was typically up to date.

In this version you also get location-based services, including weather and local movies and events (such as concerts). As with gas prices, you have the option of searching near your current location (default), along your route, near recent searches, near favorites, or near intersections, addresses, or airports. You can search for movies by title, find theaters, retrieve show times, get a brief description of each movie, call a theater, and, yes, navigate to it with a single button press. next: Hands On

VZ Navigator Version 4

excellent

Bottom Line: Verizon's latest version of VZ Navigator for its GPS-equipped cell phones adds 3D view, live traffic, and a number of location-based services, making it a well-rounded, affordable alternative to a dedicated GPS.

VZ Navigator Version 4

VZ Navigator Version 4

Get Our Best Stories!

This newsletter may contain advertising, deals, or affiliate links. Subscribing to a newsletter indicates your consent to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You may unsubscribe from the newsletters at any time.